19th Annual Nonprofit Conference on Sustainability Strategies

 

“‘Go fast, go alone; go far, go together’: Collective Impact”

October 13-14, 2011 • Desert Willow Conference Center • Phoenix

Not your usual nonprofit conference, not just for nonprofit organizations... Welcome to the world of Collective Impact! This exciting, new approach requires coordinated work by proactive organizations from business, government, general public, and nonprofit groups with a common passion for eradicating our communities' toughest challenges. Large and complex societal problems demand cross-sector work beyond the scope of a single nonprofit or governmental agency. By following the elements of collective impact, seemingly impossible challenges become possible. Learn from renowned national experts, local individuals and organizations that have or are in the process of coming together to make notable, long-term positive change.
Join more than 300 nonprofit leaders, community members and business professionals! Plus, conference attendees are invited to view an exclusive screening of the new documentary, "Saving Philanthropy: Resources to Results” that includes a moderated panel led by the film's producer, Kate Robinson. Don’t miss this special opportunity!

• Take advantage of in-depth workshops!
• Learn best-practice techniques from expert panels!
• Participate in affinity networking groups!
• Build your personal network! 

What is Collective Impact, you ask? Yeah, I had no idea, but they this link and this link provided a great intro for me. This two day conference was totally packed with info where, of course, my mind was fried by the end of of it all. Here's the agenda for Thursday, Oct 13th:

12:00 p.m.	Keynote AddressFay Hanleybrown, Managing Director, FSG Social Impact Consultants
1:00 p.m.	Networking Break and Exhibitor Fair
1:15 p.m.	Panel "Collective Impact Within the Community" Brian Spicker, Senior Vice President of Community Impact, Valley of the Sun United Way (Moderator) Paul Galdys, Senior Director of Adult Services - ACT, Magellan Health Services of Arizona Tom Simplot, District 4 Councilman, City of Phoenix Merl Waschler, President and CEO, Valley of the Sun United Way Cree Zischke, Vice President, NW and Intermountain Regions, JPMorgan Chase & Co.
2:15 p.m.	Networking Break and Exhibitor Fair
2:30 p.m.	Workshop Session #1 "Establishing Rapport: Improved Communication Skills for Going Further Through Collective Impact" Robert Gregg, MA, CFRE, The Bridge Consulting Group "From Theory to Practice: Building Nonprofit Endowments" Carrie Kinnear, Counsel for Development & Fund Raising, Arizona Endowment Building Initiative "The Circle: Principles and Practices to Generate Continuous Communication" Sharon Flanagan-Hyde, MA, Flanagan-Hyde Solutions, LLC "Orchestrating Collective Impact: The Importance of the Backbone Support Organization" Evan Mendelson, Vice President, Donor Relations and Program Services, Community Foundation for Southern Arizona Sarah Griffiths, MA, Senior Partner, Wholonomy Consulting, LLC Cassandra O’Neill, MA, Senior Partner, Wholonomy Consulting, LLC "One is a Lonely Number: Exploring New Partnerships to Affect Dramatic Change in Your Community" Conni Ingallina, Founder and President, SOS-Association Management Solutions Heilee O’Quinn, Account Executive, SOS-Association Management Solutions
3:45 p.m.	Networking Break and Exhibitor Fair
4:00 p.m.	Affinity Group Networking New Nonprofit Professionals/Emerging Leaders Senior Nonprofit Professionals with 10+ Years Development/Fundraising Professionals Marketing/PR Professionals Small Nonprofits
4:30 p.m.	Closing

My Takeaways:

The panel discussed how collective impact can accelerate and improve community conditions. The cross sector panel of community leaders talked about ongoing and prospective work utilizing a collective impact approach to address homelessness:

• There are three types of problems--Simple, Complicated and Complex--and the social sector treats problems as simple and complicated.
• Traditional approaches are not solving our toughest social problems - Isolated Impact
• Collective Impact is multiple players working together to solve complex issues: all working toward the same goal and measuring the same things; cross-sector alignment with government and corp sectors as essential partners; organizations actively coordinating.
• 5 Elements of Collective Impact are: Common Agenda, Shared Measurement (which is the least common) Mutually Reinforcing Activities, Continuous Communication and Backbone Organizations.
• 3 Phases of Collective Impact are: Organizing for Impact, Building the Common Agenda and Sustaining Action and Impact.
• You're ready for collective impact if you: have credible champions/catalysts, have a backbone support structure, have a level of resources and attention, have funders, have existing collaborative efforts, and have an urgency for change.
• 3 big mindset shifts for collective impact are: adaptive vs technical solutions, silver buckshot vs silver bullets (no single organization can create social change, but multiple organizations can), and credibility vs credit (not how you take credit but creating credibility for your organization).

Highlighted in light blue was the workshop I attended and I was highly disappointed. Here's the blurb:

A discussion using real stories of intriguing partnerships that created collective impact. Through this session you will learn how to identify and consider partners outside of your "usual suspects". Learn how collective impact does produce change through real-life examples. Join us for an interactive discussion exploring a new way of thinking about collaborative partnerships that can produce a dramatic change in your community. 

What the facilitators failed to mention was that the "intriguing partnerships", "partners outside your usual suspects" and "collaborative partnerships" they were talking about were 501(c)6 organizations (aka "trade associations"). I don't know if any of the other attendees felt a little misled, but ten minutes into the presentation, I was wondering if I had attended the wrong workshop. I felt the blurb was a little deceiving and if they had actually put 501(c)6 as part of the title or in the blurb, I wouldn't have gone. Yes, trade associations are outside the "usual suspects" but I definitely wasn't expecting the focus to be on just trade associations.

I was a little wary about attending the Affinity Group Networking thing at 4pm. Until I read what it was all about:

The purpose of the affinity groups is to give each conference participant the opportunity to connect with individuals who have similar positions/roles, interests, goals and challenges. Through guided facilitation and informal exchange, participants will have the opportunity to discuss contemporary issues in a small group format and add new contacts to their professional network of supportive colleagues.

I attended the yellow highlighted session above and found myself in a room full of Public Allies. I was surrounded by young people who were placed at nonprofit organizations and through the questions we were asked to discuss as a group, I learned:

• To utilize volunteers instead of paid staff (which is what I plan to do anyway)
• To not have a grant running just one program. Money should be dispersed to all programs because you might lose funding.
• Places to help you fundraise: Deals That Matter, Doozy of a Deal, Twitter hashtag theme.

The panel and the Affinity Group Networking made up for the disappointing  workshop. Hoping Day Two is better.